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The Trump administration plans to ban Chinese groups from buying farmland in the US, particularly near military bases, out of rising concern that their purchases are undermining national security.
US agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins on Tuesday said the administration would work with state and local governments to take “swift legislative and executive action to ban the purchase of American farmland by Chinese nationals and other foreign adversaries”.
“American agriculture is not just about feeding our families, but about protecting our nation and standing up to foreign adversaries who are buying our farmland, stealing our research and creating dangerous vulnerabilities in the very systems that sustain us,” said Rollins as she unveiled what she called the National Farm Security Action Plan.
Speaking alongside Rollins, US defence secretary Pete Hegseth said “foreign ownership of land near strategic bases and US military installations poses a serious threat to our national security”.
The announcement follows mounting concerns from lawmakers on Capitol Hill and across the country about Chinese purchases of American farmland in recent years, triggering alarm about their possible use for espionage. The US House China committee in particular has pushed for increased scrutiny of Chinese farmland acquisitions.
John Moolenaar, the Republican chair of the House China committee, said the move was a “necessary step to protect both our agriculture and our sovereignty”.
“China’s pattern of buying up our farmland isn’t just an economic play — it’s a national security threat,” Moolenaar said. “We cannot allow China to buy US farms and jeopardise the food supply American families rely on. That threat becomes even more acute when those land purchases occur near military bases.”
As part of the effort to increase scrutiny of foreign purchases of American farmland, Rollins said she would become a member of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US [Cfius], an influential Treasury-led inter-agency panel that examines foreign investments in the US for potential threats to national security.
Lawmakers want to grant Cfius the authority to examine a broader range of inbound investments.
In 2024, President Joe Biden ordered a Chinese group that was running a crypto-mining operation in Wyoming to sell the land where it operated computer servers because it was next to a base that houses US nuclear ballistic missiles. It was the first time the US had used the committee to force a foreign entity to sell American land.
Rollins said the administration would do everything in its power to “claw back” land that had already been bought by groups from China and other US adversaries.
According to 2023 department of agriculture figures, Chinese entities owned 277,336 acres of American farmland, just under 1 per cent of the total owned by foreign groups. The Chinese purchases were concentrated in Texas, North Carolina, Missouri, Utah and Florida.
The scrutiny of Chinese-owned farmland is part of a broader growing focus on ways Chinese groups could conduct espionage in the US.
Lawmakers are concerned about everything from agricultural land to Chinese wind turbines containing technology that some officials believe could facilitate electronic spying.
In recent years, the US and its partners in the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing network — Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand — have also increased public warnings about a range of Chinese investments in companies that could enable Beijing to conduct espionage in the countries.
The Chinese embassy in Washington has been approached for comment.
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